The present invention, in some embodiments thereof, relates to lenticular printing and, more particularly, but not exclusively, to an apparatus and a method for enhancing lenticular printing and displays.
Lenticular printing is a process consisting of creating a composite interlaced composite image by interlacing various images, and attaching it with a lenticular lens arrangement, such as a sheet, to form a lenticular image article. When digitally processing the composite interlaced composite image, various images are collected are flattened into individual, different frame files, and then digitally combined by interlacing into a single final file in a process which may be referred to herein as interlacing. The lenticular printing can be used to create a dynamic image, for example by offsetting the various layers at different increments in order to give a three dimension (3D) effect to the observer, various frames of animation that gives a motion effect to the observer, a set of alternate images that each appears to the observer as transforming into another. One of the most common methods of lenticular printing, which accounts for the vast majority of lenticular images in the world today, is lithographic printing of the composite interlaced composite image directly onto lower surface of a lenticular lens sheet.
Over the past several years various commercial lenticular software products have become available, and these programs all tend to address the creation of interlaced lenticular files. Existing lenticular printing processes introduce a host of problems in the form of moire, banding, checkerboard patterning, ghosting, and blurry images.
Few methods and systems have been developed to overcome these problems. For example, International Application Publication No.
WO/2010/016061 describes a method for preparing an article of lenticular imaging. The method comprises receiving a plurality of source images, superimposing at least one deghosting element on the plurality of source images, the deghosting element being formed to reduce an estimated ghosting artifact from the article, interlacing the plurality of processed source images so as to form a spatially multiplexed image, and preparing the article by attaching an optical element to the spatially multiplexed image.
Another example is described in US Patent Publication number 2010/0066817 which describes a method for identifying a blur profile of a multi image display with a first image separating mask. The method comprises displaying a calibration pattern through a second image separating mask, allowing an evaluator to provide a visual estimation indicating a blur brought about to the calibration pattern by the second image separating mask, and generating a blur profile of at least the first image separating mask according to the visual estimation. The first and second image separating masks having a substantially similar optical profile.